This page does not aim to
inform the reader about the Turkish art of calligraphy, while there
are solid sources of reference available. I shall put here some comments about
the
art of calligraphy made by late Prof. Ali Alparslan, one of the leading
authorities on the Turkish art of calligraphy. "For a Muslim calligrapher nothing could be more
natural than to wish to copy the Kuran in a beautiful script. The
different script styles evolved out of this desire to form and connect the
existing letters in a way that achieved the ideal aesthetic which is the
goal of art. Calligraphy came to be held in such regard in Ottoman Turkey
because of the way that it was developed by Ottoman calligraphers into a
fine art in its own right , a phenomenon which did not occur to the same
extent in the other Islamic countries. The Six Scripts Under the Ottomans:
The aklam-ı sitte or six scripts were all modified versions of Kufi script,
varying in only minor respects from one another. Indeed, stylistically
they are only three scripts, since Reyhani is just small scale Muhakkak,
Nesih is a small scale version of Sülüs with a few differently shaped
letters, and Rika is a small version of Tevki. Muhakkak and Reyhani were
used for writing large Korans; Sülüs, which is slightly smaller than
Muhakkak, for inscriptions, calligraphic plaques and book titles; and
Nesih for books and newspapers. Nestalik which is different from the Six
Scripts, a word meaning "suspended", it was a more legibile and easily
written form of an older hand known as Nestalik-i kadim, and was
reminiscent of swallows in flight. This script developed still further in
the 14th cent., and by the early 15th cent its characteristics and rules
of composition were becoming widely known throughout the Islamic world."